My recent movement away from flame to electric inside the Casa has brought some new stuff onboard. The most recent is a collapsible electric kettle that heats quickly and is very stable being much larger at the bottom than the top-important where boiling water is present. There are a lot of these online, some very inexpensive, but I bought one of the better ones hoping for a more robust unit. It is listed as a 700 W device but only shows about 654 W in actual use, actually favorable to me. I want it to make coffee in my Aeropress among other things and it is very good at boiling water quickly. Starting with cold tap water it boils in just 3 minutes and 30 seconds, that is for 16 oz of water, capacity is 20 oz. It can be switched from 110v to 220v so it can be used in a variety of countries.
It folds down to a cylinder 5 1/2 inches in diameter and 2 1/2 inches high, comes with a carry sack and is easy to store. Earlier this year I bought another electric sauce pan but failed to do my homework and ended up with something not suitable for the Casa. It has 3 main faults although it does cook very well and quickly, quickly because it is advertised to be either 250 W or 600 W but in reality is 350 W and 735 W on high. I needed the lower wattage but 350 is just too much. Fault # two is that it doesn't have a pouring lip and can't be poured without spilling. And the third no-no is that that the power cord goes into the end of the handle instead of at the base and makes the pan very easy to tip over, another thing I don't want in the Casa.
Power usage for the new unit seems modest with the Jackery just giving up 4% of it's power to boil water. I also bought one of the mini waffle makers that only uses 300 or 350 W and makes a four inch waffle or anything else that can be stuffed inside. Using my favorite buttermilk waffle recipe it makes a tiny but well cooked waffle in about 3 minutes. It too is easy to store. I have cooked a scrambled egg in it and it came out light and fluffy and also grated a potato and did a tiny 4" hash brown that was very good. The problem with that is that I can eat about 8 of those 4'' hash browns which would take forever to cook. So I am slowly getting electrified. I more than doubled my solar power over the winter and achieved almost a 2x improvement in charging rate for the Jackery. Electric heat is out of the question without a much bigger solar bank but I am using one of the excellent and tiny Kovea Cupid butane heaters. It is one button ignition, has 2 heat settings and is far more than adequate for a space the size of a pickup canopy. Anyone that has used a Buddy heater in a canopy knows that they are just overkill and can't be left on long plus they take up a lot of space. I buy butane online a case at a time and use it in both the Cupid and the Iwatani stove, I like it much better than propane although it doesn't work as well in real cold weather. My answer to that is to stay in by the woodstove when it is real cold and watch ballgames...
It folds down to a cylinder 5 1/2 inches in diameter and 2 1/2 inches high, comes with a carry sack and is easy to store. Earlier this year I bought another electric sauce pan but failed to do my homework and ended up with something not suitable for the Casa. It has 3 main faults although it does cook very well and quickly, quickly because it is advertised to be either 250 W or 600 W but in reality is 350 W and 735 W on high. I needed the lower wattage but 350 is just too much. Fault # two is that it doesn't have a pouring lip and can't be poured without spilling. And the third no-no is that that the power cord goes into the end of the handle instead of at the base and makes the pan very easy to tip over, another thing I don't want in the Casa.
Power usage for the new unit seems modest with the Jackery just giving up 4% of it's power to boil water. I also bought one of the mini waffle makers that only uses 300 or 350 W and makes a four inch waffle or anything else that can be stuffed inside. Using my favorite buttermilk waffle recipe it makes a tiny but well cooked waffle in about 3 minutes. It too is easy to store. I have cooked a scrambled egg in it and it came out light and fluffy and also grated a potato and did a tiny 4" hash brown that was very good. The problem with that is that I can eat about 8 of those 4'' hash browns which would take forever to cook. So I am slowly getting electrified. I more than doubled my solar power over the winter and achieved almost a 2x improvement in charging rate for the Jackery. Electric heat is out of the question without a much bigger solar bank but I am using one of the excellent and tiny Kovea Cupid butane heaters. It is one button ignition, has 2 heat settings and is far more than adequate for a space the size of a pickup canopy. Anyone that has used a Buddy heater in a canopy knows that they are just overkill and can't be left on long plus they take up a lot of space. I buy butane online a case at a time and use it in both the Cupid and the Iwatani stove, I like it much better than propane although it doesn't work as well in real cold weather. My answer to that is to stay in by the woodstove when it is real cold and watch ballgames...